hough the representative of an ancient amily, he has rebuked 'the drunken denocracy of Mr. William Pitt.' But of this ayward spirit, we are bound to add, there as been much less of late than of old. 'he violent and capricious will has not so ten run before, and committed, the masline intellect. The phrases just now toted, are not even preserved in this edin. And other evidence is here, of abated terness, of enlarged and manly tender3s, and of wisdom as generous and corI as it is lofty and pure.

In these volumes are collected, for the t time, the entire works of this remarke writer. Here are his poems, both Engand Latin, with many large and strikadditions, (we may instance the series Hellenics;) his Tragedies, his Dramatic gments, and a new five-act Play on the e of Ancona, (all which he modestly ses under the general title of Acts and es,-describing them as Imaginary 'ersations in Metre;) and his Examon of Shakespeare; his Pentameron; his Pericles and Aspasia ;-bearing, one of them, the marks of thorough on, and enriched, especially the Periwith innumerable new passages quite y of the old. Of these last-named

It is twenty-two years since the Imaginary Conversations were noticed in this Journal. They consisted then of thirty-six Dialogues, and were comprised in two volumes. In the course of the five following years, the volumes increased to five, and the Dialogues to eighty-two. In number, without naming their enlargement and increase in other respects, the latter now amount to a hundred and twenty-five, and occupy nearly a volume and a half of this general edition; which, we may remark, is beautifully, clearly, and not too minutely printed, in the form of double columns.

We

books it is not our present intention to | Greek in the form, as well as in much of speak; but we cannot pass them in even the matter of his reasoning,) are those in this recital, without remarking that in them, the celebrated Cortegiano of Raffaelle's more perhaps, than in any other of his friend, Castiglione; in which Bembo and writings, (and eminently in the exquisite others are the speakers. There is a good Pentameron, where Petrarch and Boccaccio old English translation, with the title of converse; and in the Shakespeare Exami- the Court-Gentleman. nation, where the great poet speaks as the When this Journal formerly spoke of the author of Hamlet and Othello might have Imaginary Conversations, it was pointed spoken ;) Mr. Landor's genius has thorough-out how exquisite the discrimination of ly subjected itself to those of his characters. character was in many cases, and how Every word they utter in these books, issues strange and wilful the indifference to it in out a sense of the beauty and wisdom with others: How imperfect the dramatic apwhich they had affected the writer's soul; preciation of the intellect of the speakers, nor do we feel surer of the destiny of any and of the literary tone of the age, for exexisting works with future generations. ample, in such Dialogues as those of Hume What remains to be named of the Collec- and Home ;-how perfect in such as Elization, are those famous Dialogues with beth and Burleigh, Ascham and Jane Grey, which Mr. Landor's name is most exten- Henry and Anne Boleyn, Burnet and sively associated. Hardcastle; and in all those of the Men and Women of Antiquity. We might again take up and pursue this contrast. might show how subtle and exact the art which sets before us the colloquy of Marvel and Parker, of the Emperor of China and his Minister, of Rochefoucault and La Fontaine, of Melancthon and Calvin, of Steele and Addison, of Lucian and Timetheus; and of other and grander Voices from the graves of Greece and Romewhile we condemned, for mere wilful singularity and want of keeping, the hearty, instead of dry tone of his Washington; the odd retinence of his Abbé Delille, who, Certainly no other book of Conversations, being the most talkative Frenchman on rewith which we are acquainted, can be said in cord, lets the Englishman have almost all all respects to compare with them. We do the talk to himself; the mere self-ventrilonot speak merely of the 'Dialogues' between quizing of his Franklins, Southeys, RoTheron and Aspasia, Hyls and Philonous, millys, Sheridans, Talleyrands, and even and other ideal personages;-in which his Galileos and Miltons;-his well-eduwriters, great and small, the Berkeleys and cated language, where no such advantage the Harveys, have recommended their re- could possibly have been heard of; and his spective systems of Metaphysics or Divini- high reasoning powers, where nothing of ty;-but of Dialogues attributed to real the kind existed. In one of the many adpeople, such as those by Langhorne, Lyt-ditions to the old Dialogues which we obtelton, and Hurd. Of these, Langhorne's serve in this Collection, there is indeed an little book, in which Charles the Second answer attempted on the latter point. Mr. and his Wits are speakers, is perhaps the Landor intimates that no one would care liveliest and most in character. Lyttelton for his statesmen and kingly interlocutors is also amusing, and not uncharacteristic. of the inferior class, if he were to show Hurd, though occasionally warmed by recollections of poetry and romance, is on the whole politely cold. If we went abroad to pursue the comparison, we should say, passing Fénélon, Paschal, and Fontenelle, that perhaps the best Dialogues for character, written up to the time of Mr. Landor, since the time of their great European inventor, Plato, (for the Indians were before the

them as they show themselves,-encrusted with all the dirtiness they contract in public life, in the debility of ignorance, in the distortion of prejudice, or in the trickery of partisanship. He reasons that, principles and ideas being his objects, they must not only be reflected from high and low, but must also be exhibited where people can see them best, and are most in

clined to look at them; and he implies that if this is a blemish in his book, it is one his book would be worse without.

wonted fires, and again shoot up into warmth and brightness. Large utterances,' musical and varied voices, 'thoughts We doubt this. We have great faith that breathe' for the world's advancement, for what is exact and true in every thing, words that burn' against the world's opand would for the most part leave it to tell pression, sound on throughout these lofty for what it simply is. And we suspect the and earnest pages. We are in the high secret of these perverse departures from and goodly company of Wits and Men of obvious character, to lie no deeper than Letters; of Churchmen, Lawyers, and Mr. Landor's substitution of his own caprice Statesmen; of Party men, Soldiers, and and pleasure for all other considerations. Kings; of the most tender, delicate, and It is very clear to us in such cases, that it noble Women; and of Figures that seem is Mr. Landor himself who is too plainly this instant to have left for us the Agora or visible throughout, whomsoever he makes the Schools of Athens,-the Forum or the the organ of his opinions; and with all our Senate of Rome. At one moment we hearty admiration of him, we must own have politicians discussing the deepest questhat in the special instances adverted to, tions of state; at another, philosophers still we are obstructed and thrown back by an more largely philosophizing;-poets talkamount of this personal wilfulness, far from ing of poetry, men of the world of worldly becoming such an arbiter and universalist matters, Italian and French of their reas we otherwise gladly recognize in him. spective Literatures and Manners. WhethHis opinions are then greatly too much at er such a book obtains its meed now or the command of his predilections;-some- hereafter, will be the least part of the writer's times of his momentary humors. He has ca- concern: whether it is to be read in the pricious enmities, and unreasonable likings. present age or the next, may occupy his You see assent and dissent occasioned by thought no more than whether in the mornmere regard for one speaker and dislike ing or the afternoon of the present day. for another. He runs into violent hyper- When the young gentleman who fancied boles both of praise and blame; is a great his acquaintance and patronage would be a deal too fond, for a demonstrative critic, of sweeping preferences of this and that, to all' that ever' was written in any age or country; is apt to have more images than arguments, owing to the same exuberance of fancy; sometimes allows his robust animal spirits to swell to insolence, or to degenerate into coarseness; is often too prolix in his jokes and stories; and (to get rid as fast as we can of these objections on limited points) is too much tempted, by the nicety and exactness of his scholarship, to substitute verbal criticism for spiritual; and to tire his readers with accumulated objections to people whom the world have long ceased to make gods of.

comfort to Doctor Johnson, grieved very much to think that the introduction must lie over for a little while, the Doctor remarked, in his heavy solid way,' Why, sir, I can wait! So can Mr. Landor.

Are you certain that in their inferences they are all quite sound?'-is one of the new questions, in one of the old Dialogues. Indeed,' is Mr. Landor's candid and sufficient answer, 'I do not know perfectly that they are; but they will give such exercise in discussing them, as always tends to make other men's healthier.' Nothing can more truly indicate what is probably, after all, their greatest charm. Mr. Landor's genius has a wonderfully suggestive But, these drawbacks stated, how little quality. Even where he most offends in reality they affect the great bulk of against taste or judgment, he rarely fails these Conversations. What a weighty book to stimulate thought and reflection. Parathey make! How rich in scholarship; doxes, in him simply wilful and preposterhow correct, concise, and pure in style; ous, will often be found to contain very prohow full of imagination, wit, and humor; found truths for us. We may assent or we how well informed, how bold in speculation, may oppose, but we must think when in how various in interest, how universal in company with him; and we shall always sympathy! In these hundred and twenty-find ourselves the wealthier for what thought five Dialogues, making allowance for every germinates within us. How much the shortcoming or excess, the most familiar more when, in his higher and nobler compoand the most august shapes of the Past are reanimated with vigor, grace, and beauty. Its long dead ashes rekindle suddenly their

sitions, we see Suggestion drop its richest fruit in perfected and consummate Truths; and when every thought and feeling are